I made it – I got HERE TO STAY formatted for print by the end of the month, just like I resolved to do. It is beautiful, if I do say so myself. Is it perfect? Probably not – at least not by my standards – but for now I’m going to run with it.
To celebrate this momentous achievement, leave a comment from now til Sunday and you’ll be eligible to win a signed proof copy of HERE TO STAY, winner to be announced on Monday.
Our one full day in Chicago, Friday, was a gray, foggy, drippy mess. It didn’t *really* matter because we were planning on going to the Shedd Aquarium anyway. I didn’t get any pictures worth sharing in the aquarium – if you want to know what it is like, you’ll just have to go for yourself. It is totally worth the trip. We spent about three hours wandering around and still didn’t see everything. The only thing I wasn’t so impressed with was the 4D Movie. We saw Planet Earth. First of all, it wasn’t originally produced in 3D so the effects they managed to add-in were unimpressive and blowing some air on our necks, bumping our seats once, and piping in some bubbles did not WOW me into thinking I was in the Arctic. The Jellies exhibit, however, was great and the aquatic show was fun – not to mention all the regular exhibits. Overall, I highly recommend the aquarium.
Saturday morning was somewhat better weather so we took a walk down to Millennium Park to see The Bean – a Chicago landmark. How can you go to Chicago and not get a picture with The Bean? (Unless of course you happen to be in the midst of a nasty dermatological peel and flee from all cameras).
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We started at my friends’ condo near the Museum Campus. Just across the street from their place is a park with these walking leg sculptures.
I think they are made of iron. Kind of strange, huh? They remind me of something out of a Roald Dahl story.
The next big scenic item we saw was Buckingham Fountain. It’s lovely, isn’t it?
I believe these are cherry blossoms, but don’t quote me on that.
Then finally we came to The Bean. Isn’t it amazing?
Even the under side was fantastic.
I can only be grateful that we got to see it on such a lovely clear day.
As you might imagine, I have several pictures of the children pretending to lift the bean. I could have taken pictures for hours with the optical illusions it created.
After walking nearly all the way back to the condo, we stopped for breakfast at Yolk, then my friends went shopping and the children and I did a whirlwind tour of The Field Museum. We didn’t see everything, but we did see dinosaur bones – a must see for any little boy in your company.
And that was the end of our time in Chicago. It might have been better if the weather had been nicer, but I have absolutely nothing to complain about. You get what you get when you visit in April!
Spring break is over and the children are going back to school tomorrow. I’m going to bask in the glow of last week for a little while longer however and share some pictures of our quick trip to Chicago.
How much luckier can a girl get – not only do we have a week off, but I just happen to have a couple of friends from way back who own a condo in Chicago. I would have gone to see them in any event and been happy at their place in Ohio, but I surely wasn’t going to turn down a suggestion to go and spend a few days in Chicago since they offered.
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Here is the view from their condo – notice Soldier Field to the right:
And now to the left. Is that amazing or what?
I could not have dreamed up a better location for taking the children to see some of the big attractions – the Shedd Aquarium, the Field Museum, and the planetarium were right across the street!
We didn’t arrive in Chicago until mid-afternoon and since the weather was clear we decided to seize the opportunity and go up to see the view from a tall building. We choose the Hancock Building.
It isn’t the highest building in the world, or even in Chicago, but going up 94 floors in 40 seconds was impressive enough for me. I occasionally have nightmares about speeding elevators so though the ride was smooth enough, it was still a little freaky for me!
It has never been my particular goal to live in a giant city, but even I was impressed with the view.
After we’d seen the view from every angle available, we strolled down Michigan Avenue and window shopped for a few blocks. That worked up our appetites nicely for some Chicago-style pizza. Y-U-M. Why does anyone eat any other kind of pizza?
It is a good thing we went up to see the view when we did because the next day, our only full day in Chicago, looked like this:
The fog and drizzle didn’t slow us down though – we just spent the day inside at the Shedd Aquarium instead.
It’s just as well that I don’t live at the condo full time or I’d never get anything done for looking out at the view all the time. It was even pretty at night.
Stay tuned for part 2 of Chicago on Wednesday: A sunny day and The Bean.
Whenever I think of Easter, I think of dyed eggs, Easter baskets filled with plastic grass, chocolate bunnies and eggs, and a big dinner – preferably featuring baked ham. My family was not particularly religious when I was growing up, but there were a few constants at certain holidays and candy featured heavily at Easter.
Easter is in fact celebrated all around the world, and the differences in traditions from place to place can be both very interesting and somewhat puzzling.
Bermuda: Bermudians celebrate Good Friday by flying home-made kites, eating codfish cakes, and eating hot cross buns.
Europe: In parts of Northwestern Europe large bonfires, called Easter Fires, are lit on Easter Sunday and Monday. While there are various explanations for the origin of the Easter Fires, the most common Saxon tale is that Easter is a time when spring becomes victorious over winter and the fires were to chase the darkness of winter away.
Sweden: In the days leading up to Easter Sunday, children dress up as Easter witches, wearing old and discarded clothes. Traveling from home to home in their neighborhoods, the children trade paintings and drawings for sweets.
I know many Christian holidays have pagan roots, but dressing up like witches at Easter? It’s a bit better than Sweden’s other tradition which is to have the boys beat the girls with switches in the early morning – but at least the girls get to have their turn in the evening!
I found another great site called Easter Bunny’s.net. They have information on a long list of countries, a few of which I have included below:
Egypt: Lent in the Coptic Church of Egypt lasts for 55 days, which includes a preliminary week of modified fasting. No meat, fish, eggs or milk are supposed to be eaten during Lent. This fasting is extended as Lent goes on so that by Holy Week people are observing a stricter fast, in which they eat mainly vegetables and beans.
During Holy Week, people go to church every day. There are services leading up to the main Easter service on Saturday night, which lasts until 3-4 a.m. on Easter morning. Bells are rung to proclaim Christ’s resurrection, and there is a procession with the newly lit candles.
Easter Sunday is spent visiting friends and relatives, and there is a special Easter dinner in the afternoon. Easter Monday is a public holiday because of an ancient spring festival (called Sham al Nassim) which is celebrated on this day. People spend the day outdoors in parks or gardens and exchange colored eggs.
Mexico: In many communities, they may enact a full Passion Play from the Last Supper, the Betrayal, the Judgment, the Procession of the 12 Stations of the Cross, the Crucifixion and last but not least the Resurrection. In some communities, flagellation and/or real crucifixion might also be included. The enactments are often spectacularly staged, costumed and acted, with participants preparing for their roles for nearly the full year leading up to Semana Santa.
Papua New Guinea: On Easter Sunday a church service is held, and at this service there is the Easter Tree. At the front of the church is a small tree or if they are unable to have a tree several branches are tied together, on which sticks of tobacco and packets of cigarettes are hung. After the service, these are distributed amongst the congregation. The people then return to their homes for a feast of leftovers usually from the Friday feast.
Chocolate bunnies and baked hams are pretty tame and rate a big fat ZERO on the self-sacrifice scale next to fasting and crucifixion reenactments. (I don’t know what is up with the cigarette trees.) To each his own I suppose.
My children were very concerned how the Easter Bunny was going to find them this year since we are not at home. I told them it wasn’t going to be a problem. I’ve always just said that the Easter Bunny was magical, like Santa, which was always a good enough explanation. Last weekend they saw the movie Hop and now they really like the idea of a big egg shaped vehicle pulled by a flock of fluffy yellow chicks. Um…Okay…
However you choose to spend your Easter holiday (or not) I hope you have a pleasant day. I’ll probably spend mine biting my tongue about how much candy the kids are eating!
I’ve always liked making things. I can remember making pot holders and latch hook rugs before I discovered needlework. The first time I did any cross stitch was in fourth grade when we did a Mother’s Day project in art class. I loved it so much I designed a complementary pattern for Father’s Day. Soon after I started spending my allowance at the local craft shop on cross stitch fabric and embroidery floss and graph paper.
I used to make little pictures for friends and relatives as gifts. I made a baby gift in 1985 for the friend I am visiting for spring break and though I had forgotten all about it, she still has it.
It’s a bit plain, but it isn’t so bad considering that I am sure I made up the design on my own when I was 14 years old!
It’s spring break this week but I don’t have any pictures of white sandy beaches to share. I could take a picture of the rising river flooding the woods behind my friend’s house but it’s kind of gray and blah looking. I’ve been having a wonderful time visiting and chatting and generally just hanging around and stuffing my face! We go to Chicago tomorrow morning – I’ll have more interesting photos and experiences to share them.
Instead I’ll share this video. It is truly amazing in its combination of simplicity and complexity – I can’t imagine figuring out how to construct the musical wooden track!
I wonder how many takes they did when filming this video?
It’s Spring Break this week and I’m traveling again – this time staying with a friend in northern Ohio, with a side trip to Chicago later this week. I remember now why most people go to Florida or the Caribbean if they have the option – it’s damp, cold, and gray where I am and apparently it even snowed a little in Chicago! I intend to have fun anyway – expect pictures next week even if it is gray and drippy!
Today I’m blog traveling too – come and visit me over at Terry Place. Leave a comment for me and you could win a paperback copy of my book Separation Anxiety.
Spring has more or less arrived in southern Ohio, and as I sit inside doing my best to enjoy the sunny days from the shelter and shade of the house (as is necessary while I treat my skin for years of accumulated sun damage with a potent and nasty cream) I’ve been thinking about cultural norms of beauty, particularly with regard to skin tone.
Generally speaking, it seems that everyone always wants what they don’t have. In the West, a golden tan is most often equated with health and vitality. I spent many hours laying in the sun in my youth chasing that particular ideal. Even knowing what we all should know by now about premature aging and skin cancer, people still lay in tanning beds or out by the pool in the middle of the day, and it would be interesting to know how many artificial tanning products are available on the market. Why is it so bad to be fair? I’m blonde – all I ever got for my time in the sun was at best a short lived “tan” and at worst a sunburn and a bunch of freckles.
As an aside, it’s funny because people in the Middle East don’t really understand freckles – they are more or less seen as a kind of disfigurement. Only the rare person ever expressed the opinion that they were cute on my children. I once won a series of micro-dermabrasion facials while I was living in Dubai. When I went in for the treatments, the consultant promised me not only softer, smoother skin but also that given enough time she could remove my “sun spots”. I laughed and explained to her that they weren’t going anywhere! Another time the mother of child at the preschool my son was attending, a Pakistani woman who also happened to have a medical degree, asked me what all the spots on my son’s face were – what was wrong with him? I explained to her what a freckle is in a medical sense and she understood, but she still seemed to feel a bit sorry for him!
Ironically, in the Middle East and Asia, light unblemished skin is the ideal. I have met all too many lovely, dark and olive skinned Middle Eastern and Indian women who want nothing more than to lighten their skin tone. You won’t see them baking themselves on a lounge chair – they are much more likely to stay inside during the day or at least in the shade, and their modest dress not only fulfills religious mandates but also protects them from the harsh sun of those latitudes. There are all manner of home remedies for skin lightening, many of which revolve around lemon juice, as well as many lightening creams on the market in those areas of the world, the most popular of which is called Fair & Lovely. Not a very subtle marketing trick, is it?
If only people could be happy with what their genetic gene pool gives them. Not only would it save everyone a lot of unhappiness but money – surely at least half of the “beauty aid” market would crash if we’d all stop fighting our DNA.
My face is currently red and scaly and would be considered very undesirable and unattractive no matter where in the world you come from. I’m trying to focus on the fact that this isn’t forever. I’m also using it as a lesson for my children and I think it’s working: They haven’t been complaining nearly so much about my putting sunscreen on them lately.
why I was procrastinating doing the formatting for getting my books ready for paperback – the formatting process is a giant pain in the butt!!!
Sigh… I have to be inside anyway, so I might as well do it, right? Should have HERE TO STAY ready to go by the end of the month (and that includes getting the proof copy approved, etc).
I write books for fun so why is it so hard to write my own bio? I am an American currently living in Cairo, Egypt. Aside from writing, I'm a married mom of two under ten, a decent (if reluctant) cook, an encyclopedia of random scientific / medical facts, a wine lover (but not a snob!), and a Capricorn. I love to travel, spend time with good friends, and laugh at life's surprises. View of life - definitely half full.
I made it – I got HERE TO STAY formatted for print by the end of the month, just like I resolved to do. It is beautiful, if I do say so myself. Is it perfect? Probably not – at least not by my standards – but for now I’m going to run with it.
